Update On The Brouhaha Between British Columbia And Alberta -- April 17, 2018

There are several stories that fascinate me: ObamaCare (pretty much "New Diet Coke"); Netflix; Apple, Inc; and, now, the brouhaha between Alberta and British Columbia. Is "brouhaha" the best word to use in this context? Whatever.

Apparently the word on the street is that Ms Notley will be defeated in the next election. The next election will take place on or before May 31, 2019.

She has said "the pipeline" will be built. She has threatened British Columbia with economic repercussions if the pipeline is further delayed or "killed."

Apparently things are starting to happen.

Apparently there are already some pipelines that run from Alberta to the west coast of British Columbia. These pipelines carry refined products (such as gasoline and diesel fuel) which customers in British Columbia purchase and consume. The pipelines also carry crude oil that is refined in a Burnaby, British Columbia, refinery. The pipelines also carry crude oil (and refined products?) for export, mostly to Asia.

Apparently, right now, the pipeline moves product based on a free market, capitalistic system.

According to Irina Slav at oilprice.com, a bill to change this "system" has been introduced into the Alberta legislature.

If passed, the bill will give the Alberta provincial government the authority to license fuel traders. The Alberta government will be able to control what products and how much product will go through those pipelines.

Facts:

• Alberta supplies 50% of total fuel imported by British Columbia
• the only refinery in British Columbia is the Burnaby (Vancouver) refinery
• this refinery produces 25% of BC's fuels
• without the "right" kind of fuel the refinery cannot operate properly
• British Columbia has other options: fuel and crude oil from west coast of the United States; problem:
• more expensive
• would also likely raise cost/prices of oil and refined products for consumers on the US west coast

It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

But, also think about this: there are likely political folks in the US who are watching this closely. Could the US federal government or could individual states get into the pipeline licensing business (licensing, and thereby controlling pipelines more than they are already controlled?). After all, the federal government, through RINS, has greatly affected production in US refineries.

Regardless, the bill introduced into the Alberta legislature is certainly very interesting.

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The Apple Page

From Macrumors:

The iPhone X accounted for 35 percent of total worldwide handset profits in the fourth quarter of 2017.

The device generated 5x more profit than the combined profit of more than 600 Android OEMs during the quarter, despite the fact that it was only available for purchase during the final two months of the year and in spite of reports pointing towards lackluster sales of the device.